MEDIA TRANSCRIPTS, INC. - Intelligence Squared US · 2006. 9. 27. · Media Transcripts, Inc. PROGRAM Rosenkranz Foundation—“Intelligence Squared U.S.” “We must tolerate a

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PROGRAM “Intelligence Squared U.S.” “We must tolerate a nuclear Iran”

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ROBERT ROSENKRANZ Good evening, everyone, and welcome. I’m Robert Rosenkranz,

chairman of Intelligence Squared U.S. Debate Forum, which is an

initiative of the Rosenkranz Foundation. It’s a very special

pleasure for me to welcome you today to our inaugural debate of

our inaugural season. With this series of live debates, and with

our national radio audience, we’re pursuing a lofty and ambitious

goal. We’re trying to raise the level of public discourse in

American life. We see a Congress that’s mired in partisan rancor,

we see much of the media increasingly ideological. We see policy

intellectuals in the think-tank world preaching to their respective

choirs, and the discussion of contentious policy issues

everywhere, dominated by intense emotions, rather than by facts

and reasoned analysis. But Intelligence Squared is not about the

search for bland middle ground. Rather, we want to encourage

each side of an argument to sharpen its own thinking by listening

to opposing views, and responding to inconvenient facts. We

want our audience, who voted on tonight’s resolution coming in,

Media Transcripts, Inc. PROGRAM Rosenkranz Foundation—“Intelligence Squared U.S.” “We must tolerate a nuclear Iran (9/27/06) Page 2.

to vote again after hearing the debate. As our great Judge Pierre

LeBeau said, “You know you have a mind, when you change it.”

[LAUGHTER]

Whether or not you change your mind, I hope you’ll come away

with the recognition that there is an intellectually respectable

position on the other side. For that is the real point of our

initiative. We want to promote a civil society in America that is

truly civil—where we increase our respect for opposing views, we

reduce our anger and emotion, and we call on the best within

ourselves, as we confront the challenging issues of our day.

We’re thrilled that WNYC is recording our series of debates, and

that through National Public Radio, you’ll be able to hear this

debate in most of the major cities across the country on local NPR

stations. My wife Alexandra Munroe commissioned the study

that was the first concrete step in this initiative, and she has

made invaluable contributions every step of the way.

We value the sponsorship of the Times of London, their support,

and indeed the excellence of the debates themselves is part of a

team effort. I want to especially thank our moderator Robert

Siegel, the voice of “All Things Considered,” and the extraordinary

group of panelists who are the true stars of tonight’s event. But

one individual merits special acknowledgement—our executive


producer, Dana Wolfe, a former “ABC News Nightline” producer

who brought extraordinary determination, intelligence, and

experience to this project. Thank you, Dana. [APPLAUSE] I’d

like to close by quoting two political leaders, one American, one

British. Al Gore, at the Clinton Global Initiative last week,

speaking on the subject of global warming as a crisis, said, “The

debate is over.” And now, Margaret Thatcher. “I love argument.

I love debate. I don’t expect anyone to just sit there and agree

with me. that’s not their job.” Well, at the risk of showing my

own partisanship, I’d like to declare a victory for Britain.

[LAUGHTER]

Of course Oxford-style debate is a long and vigorous tradition in

Britain, and Intelligence Squared was founded in London, where

it’s an esteemed institution and a major success. There it

attracts a live audience of 800 of London’s most influential

figures. I’m honored to welcome the founders, media

entrepreneurs Jeremy O’Grady, and John Gordon, and pass the

microphone over to John, who will share his thoughts and

introduce our moderator for the evening.

[APPLAUSE]

JOHN GORDON Thank you very much, Robert. We’re absolutely delighted that

Intelligence Squared has come to America thanks to the


Rosenkranz Foundation. It’s great for the baby that Jeremy

O’Grady and I have been nurturing for 25 or more years and that

we created four years ago has now come over the pond.

]Intelligence Squared in London has really taken off. Everyone

there loves debate and even though it’s very much part of our

tradition, it’s not very much a part of the tradition in London--

there isn’t any regular series of debates other than Intelligence

Squared. I hope this evening you’ll enjoy the two particular

pleasures I think that we enjoy from the debate, one is that, this

is probably the first time that you’ll have the opportunity to hear

oratory. I mean there is very seldom—few outlets where you can

hear somebody speaking for eight or nine minutes in trying to

persuade you to vote for or against a particular motion. And I

think the other great sort of pleasure of debate, which again I’m

sure you’ll experience this evening—particularly if you’re

undecided as to the motion—is the great pleasure of hearing the

proposer arguing the motion, agreeing with them, and then eight

minutes later actually agreeing with the other side. And it’s that

intellectual ping-pong that is particularly exciting.

We’ve been slightly surprised by the enormous take-up of

Intelligence Squared, there’s been a vast amount of interest from

companies around the world interviewing us, writing articles

about it. It’s almost sort of emblematic of the stereotypes of


various countries, for example the French who have written about

it and interviewed us, are particularly surprised by the fact that

the speakers who are normally extremely rude to each other in

English debate end up going out to dinner with each other.

[LAUGHTER] The Germans who’ve interviewed us twice and

written an article in Der Spiegel, were actually surprised by

debate, full stop. [LAUGHTER] As a consensual society they’ve

just never really sort of experienced the idea of debate. And the

Japanese, with whom we did an interview on Tokyo FM very

recently, a live interview to 20 million people, in the course of the

interview it was clear that they completely misunderstood what

we were doing. [LAUGHTER]

They asked us, how many people have gotten married during the

course of a meeting. [LAUGHTER] They rather thought we were

a dating agency. [LAUGHTER] So we’re rather curious to see

how you are going to respond to this very quintessential British

sport of adversarial debate. I’d like now to hand over the

microphone to our very distinguished moderator this evening,

Robert Siegel. Robert is a senior host of National Public Radio’s

award-winning evening news magazine, “All Things Considered.”

He got started in radio news when he was a college freshman in

1964, and he’s still at it. As a host, Robert has reported from

Europe, the Middle East and all over the United States. He


served for four years as director of NPR’s news and information

department. I’m now very pleased to turn the evening over to

Robert for the debate, “We must tolerate a nuclear Iran.” Thank

you.

[APPLAUSE]

ROBERT SIEGEL Thank you, John Gordon, for your introduction, and I’d like to

welcome all of you to the inaugural Intelligence Squared U.S.

debate. I’d like to begin with some housekeeping. First the

obligatory announcement at all public gatherings— could you

please turn off your cell phones, pagers, PDA’s, things that beep,

talking toys or whatever else you might have with you tonight,

that might interrupt the debate. Also, if you have something that

you might be tempted to unwrap in the course of the evening, this

is being recorded for broadcast in radio, and the sound of

wrapping paper crinkling is often a substitute for crackling fire,

or it was in the old days. So please do the unwrapping now,

before we begin.

I’d like to explain the proceedings, what’s going to happen this

evening. First, the proposer of the motion will start by proposing

that side of the argument, and the opposition will follow. We will

alternate from the pro to the con side, each presentation being

eight minutes. I’ll be the time cop, and I’ll give them two-minute


and one-minute warnings, and if they keep on talking, I’ll tell you

to turn your cell phones back on and interrupt them.

[LAUGHTER] After all six speakers have spoken and finished,

we’ll then have a question-and-answer session in which we will

welcome your questions, and also your brief statements, and they

will respond to you. When that question-and-answer session is

complete, each debater will make a final statement lasting no

more than two minutes. Now, during the closing statements we

then come to this perforated ballot-ticket that you were given on

the way in.

You were asked as you entered whether you were for or against

the motion or undecided, and once again we will ask you, after

you’ve heard from all of our speakers, to vote again, and you will

do that in a manner I’ll describe. If you don’t have one of these

now, we’ll take care of that when the time comes and the usher

will provide you with a ballot. Then after we’ve heard all the

closing statements, we shall announce the results of both the poll

that we took on the way in, and also the voting after you’ve heard

these, what I hope will be very interesting and persuasive

presentations. I’d like to introduce our panel right now. First,

those who support and propose the notion that we must tolerate

a nuclear Iran. George Perkovich is a U.S. foreign policy expert

and vice-president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for


International Peace. Welcome. Karim Sadjadpour, formally

based in Tehran, is a writer and Iran analyst for the International

Crisis Group. Sanam Vakil is assistant professor of Middle East

Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced

International Studies. That’s the side that proposes the motion

we’re going to hear debated.

To my left this evening, are Patrick Clawson, who is an author

and also deputy director at the Washington Institute for Near

East Policy, Reuel Marc Gerecht, an expert in Middle East affairs,

formerly with the CIA, currently a resident fellow at the American

Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, and best-selling

author and co-founder/editor of the Washington-based political

magazine The Weekly Standard, William Kristol. Bill Kristol

rounds out our panel. So let us start the debate, proposing the

motion, “We must tolerate a nuclear Iran,” George Perkovich,

please take the podium.

GEORGE PERKOVICH [Thank you. I’m intrigued by the “Dating Game” idea so maybe

we can return to that in the question part. It’s an evening event,

everybody’s tired from work. To judge the motion, “We must

tolerate a nuclear Iran,” you must evaluate the alternatives to it.

Ideally, the United States and other leading actors can prevent

Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Indeed, all six of us here


agree emphatically that the U.S. and the international community

must do everything possible, and more than has been done

already, to try to prevent this. We all agree with that, we all work

on that much of our time. We can talk about some of the steps

that that might entail, including the United States being willing to

engage in direct negotiations with Iran if Iran is willing to do so,

which is a big question. We should talk about security

guarantees to Iran, which Patrick has written about in the form

of, “We will not attack you if you don’t attack us.” We should

right now be mustering Iran’s neighbors— perhaps secretly, some

of it openly—into a much tighter, cohesive network to try to

cooperate on intelligence, air monitoring, perhaps moving ballistic

missile defenses into the region, to show Iran that its freedom of

maneuver will be diminished if it moves forward with nuclear

weapons.

We have to be much more direct with President Putin in Russia.

Russia is the biggest impediment of getting the Security Council

to take strong actions, and we can talk about that later. The

general point is, prevention, all of us agree, is the best option.

Yet prevention is not the proposition we’ve been asked to debate

here tonight. The question we are debating, is whether we can

tolerate a nuclear Iran. That question assumes that diplomacy

has failed, and we’re on to other options. Then we have to ask,


well, what are the alternatives to tolerating an Iran that possesses

nuclear weapons. Well, one might say, well, we kill ourselves. If

we can’t tolerate, we kill ourselves. That’s not a good option.

The second option will be, well, we’ll kill all of them. Make the

problem go away. Also not a good option, there are 74 million of

them, three times the population of Iraq. Even if somehow it were

morally justifiable, it wouldn’t necessarily solve the problem. The

most feasible strategy that is the alternative, the most feasible

strategy for not tolerating a nuclear Iran, is an attack—a

combination of attack on its known nuclear facilities, on its air

force and navy to try to prevent its capacity to retaliate

immediately, and on the Revolutionary Guard, to try to hasten

regime change. This ought to be examined, and there are a long

list of questions that arise from this. But the key thing in terms

of the motion before us is, that you should not assume that this

is a question of will power. In other words, if one says, “I will not

tolerate a nuclear Iran,” that somehow that solves the problem,

that the will power to act—meaning to conduct a war—somehow

achieves the objective of eliminating Iran’s nuclear capability.

There’s no reason actually to conclude that it would—that even if

you had the will, you could eliminate that capability. But you

have to factor that in, as well as the consequences of a potential


action. Now if I thought that a military attack of this type I

described would actually eliminate that nuclear capability, and do

it for a sufficient time, I would be for it, if the consequences of our

attack were not going to leave us worse off. But to conclude that

the consequences won’t leave us worse off, you have to ask a

bunch of questions. To his great credit, Reuel Gerecht, our

colleague, has written an essay last April in the Weekly Standard,

that’s a very detailed treatment of a military option, which he

ultimately advocates. Reuel talks about a campaign, a military

campaign, that he says would be “a series of actions and counter-

actions between the U.S. and Iran, that would probably transpire

over many years, perhaps a decade or more.”

Now there’s a long list of questions that arise when you

contemplate a war with Iran lasting a decade or more. You’d have

to know if we buy some time, maybe two or three years, in the

first attack, what happens. Well, the most likely thing that

happens is the inspectors have to go, that’s been our major

source of intelligence. So now when you want to figure out what

else to attack over these years, your capacity actually to pinpoint

things has diminished. The probability of hitting false targets,

wrong targets, killing innocent people, being subjected to media

treatments then of the mistaken bombing, goes up, and with each

mistaken bomb, U.S. credibility in the world, in the region, in


Iran, is diminished. There are other questions. What are the

odds then an air war will improve the prospects for democracy in

Iran? What are the odds that another war will make Iran less

threatening to the U.S. and Israel?

What are the odds that another war led by the United States will

increase America’s capacity to solve the other problems in the

world—Iraq, Afghanistan, the war on terror, international trade?

You name the issues, will our credibility be enhanced if we

conduct another war in the Middle East? Now Reuel wrote his

essay before the war in Lebanon. I would argue that war has

even further raised the bar, the difficulty, of thinking that a war

against Iran will actually solve this problem. We believe that

another war would leave the United States and the world worse

off than we would be by pursuing an alternative strategy. If you

agree, you should vote in favor of the resolution. We argue

there’s plenty of evidence to conclude that if more energetic

efforts to prevent Iran from getting nuclear—

ROBERT SIEGEL Two minutes—

GEORGE PERKOVICH —fail, it will still be possible to deter and contain Iran from using

nuclear weapons against anyone. Iran’s president is alarming, he

is indeed alarming. But the leadership in Iran is collective, and it


includes many old men. These old men did not get old by being

suicidal. Iran, Persia, has thousands of years of grand history,

and there’s no reason whatsoever to think that Iranian

nationalists would sacrifice their nation and their civilization in a

nuclear war of their making. There is other evidence of Iran’s

deterability. Iran has not attacked the weaker United Arab

Emirates with which it has a dispute over two resource-rich

islands. Iran did not attack the Sunni extremist Taliban

government in Afghanistan, even when that government killed,

murdered, nine Iranian diplomats.

ROBERT SIEGEL One minute.

GEORGE PERKOVICH Iran has a Jewish population that is free to leave but chooses not

to. There is no evidence that Iran is not deterable. Indeed, as

Reuel has written, “The Islamic republic ceased to produce holy

warriors by the end of the Iran-Iraq War in 1988. The potential

for chiliastic rapture has just dried up.” The bigger point is this.

Voting for the motion does not mean doing nothing, or turning

the other cheek to Iran. Voting for the motion means deciding

that another war will not solve this problem, and that a robust,

extremely tough strategy of deterrence and containment would be

the most effective way to keep a nuclear Iran from threatening the

United States and its friends. Thank you.


[APPLAUSE]

ROBERT SIEGEL Thank you, George Perkovich, for proposing the motion before us,

“We must tolerate a nuclear Iran.” And now to the podium we

call the first opponent of that motion, Patrick Clawson.

PATRICK CLAWSON I thought George gave a very eloquent statement of why we

should not go to war with Iran, and if that were the proposition

that we were debating, I think his arguments were spot-on. That

however is not the proposition we’re debating. The proposition

we’re debating is that we should not tolerate a nuclear Iran.

That’s quite a different matter. In fact, there are many things

that we could do, even if Iran got a nuclear weapon, that would

suggest to me that we would have non-military ways in order to

persuade Iran to give up that weapon. Most of the countries of

the world which developed—which had nuclear weapons have

given them up, and not through war. So there are in fact many

things that we can do, that would show we cannot tolerate a

nuclear Iran, short of war. So I would rather spend my time

discussing the proposition as stated to you, namely that we

cannot tolerate a nuclear Iran, rather than discussing whether or

not to go to war with Iran.

I would like to suggest that when it comes to a nuclear Iran, the


proposition is very well-stated, because it leaves vague exactly

what do we mean. Are we talking about the nuclear family in

Iran? Or what are we talking about here? [LAUGHTER] I for

one have no objections if Iranians care to choose to live in nuclear

families. But what we are likely to have is a very gray case. We

in fact do not have a smoking gun to show that Iran has a

nuclear weapons program. It’s unlikely that we’re going to wake

up some morning to find that Iran has exploded a nuclear

weapon. What we have to deal with instead, is what Iran openly

declares that it is doing—namely building this complicated thing

called a nuclear fuel cycle, to make the materials for having a

nuclear weapon.

The Iranians themselves have described well why they’re doing

this. In a remarkable speech, their chief negotiator for their

nuclear weapons program wrote that having a fuel-cycle

capability almost means the country that possesses this

capability is able to produce nuclear weapons, should that

country have the political will to do so. Now that’s the judgment

of the Iranian government. The Nobel Peace Prize-winning head

of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohammed Al

Baradei—who you may recall was no friend of George Bush on

the Iraq matter—says that if Iran does what Iran announces it’s

intending to do, that Iran will be, quote, “a few months,” end


quote, away from having a nuclear weapon. So our real question

is, do we want to see Iran have that kind of a capability, on the

edge of having a nuclear weapon but not quite there. We’re not

going to have the dramatic moment where Iran explodes a nuclear

weapon necessarily. If we need to act, we need to act much

before then. We need to act when Iran is getting this capability to

make the essential elements for a nuclear weapon. That is what

we have to concentrate on stopping.

Indeed, why do I think that that is something that not only we

cannot tolerate, but we need not tolerate. Let me count some of

the reasons. First is that what the Iranians are doing, is

exploiting a loophole in the system that we have constructed to

make sure that the world does not have a hundred countries with

nuclear weapons. The Iranians have correctly identified a real

weakness in our system of stopping the spread of nuclear

weapons. Indeed, Muhammad Al Baradei has proposed a five-

year moratorium on the construction of all fuel-cycle facilities

worldwide, and has said that any such facility should be under

international control, because the technology is so dangerous.

If Iran gets away with building this, it will not be the only

country. We will not only have to tolerate a nuclear Iran, we will

have to tolerate a nuclear Turkey, a nuclear Egypt, a nuclear


Saudi Arabia. A nuclear Algeria. A nuclear Venezuela. A nuclear

South Africa. A nuclear Brazil. When we start having 20 or 30

countries with nuclear weapons, and we start having a multiple

system of deterrence, it’s going to be very interesting if we have to

go through the Cuban Missile Crisis another 20 or 30 or 40

times. I’m not confident it’ll turn out so positively every time. I

don’t think that deterrence is something that we can count on

working every time, the way it did work with the Soviets, once the

Soviets got so tired and Brezhnev took over, and couldn’t care

less about revolution. But in any case, I say we cannot tolerate a

nuclear Iran, because if we tolerate a nuclear Iran, we will be

tolerating many, many more nuclear countries, and that is not

something that will lead to peace in the world.

Furthermore, we need not tolerate a nuclear Iran, because there

is much that we can do to stop it without having to talk about

going to war. The fact is that Iran has acknowledged to the

International Atomic Energy Agency that it’s been carrying out

these clandestine nuclear activities for 18 years. But they haven’t

gotten very far. Now, a lot of that has broadcast our success, in

fact having a system which does limit what Iran can do. We have

had a lot of successes in our efforts in stopping Iran’s program.

You may recall that we were very worried when the Soviet Union

fell apart that its scientists and nuclear matter would show up


around the world, causing proliferation. We started a big

program called the Nunn-Lugar Program to prevent that. And in

fact, none of it has shown up in Iraq. None of it.

Indeed, the Iranians have had to, on the whole, do things

themselves. The only thing that they were able to buy was a set

of blueprints from A.Q. Khan of Pakistan. I don’t know about

you, but I can’t assemble furniture from Ikea when I buy it with

the blueprints. I certainly can’t program my VCR with the

instructions that come with it. So buying a set of blueprints

didn’t really get the Iranians necessarily that far ahead. Indeed,

that’s why their program has taken 18 years, and is going very

slowly. President Ahmadinejad of Iran claimed this last spring

that they were going to have—


PATRICK CLAWSON —3,000 centrifuges up and operational by the end of the year. I

don’t think he’s going to have 300. And we can, by reinforcing

our system of controls on Iran’s access to advanced technology,

by mobilizing the world community, slow down Iran’s program

dramatically. To the point where Iran might be able to make one

bomb, but I don’t think it’ll be able to make a lot of bombs, and it

certainly won’t have a way to deliver that thing. And if this bomb


ends up being some two-ton monstrosity that they can barely fit

into a bread truck, then they won’t have easy ways of delivering

this thing. So, there are always ways in which the control on

technologies makes the real difference. That’s why we should

continue our efforts to limit Iran’s access to these advanced

technologies, rather than tolerating a nuclear Iran and saying,

well, now you’re in the nuclear club. Okay, join the club, you can

do what you want. No. We should, even if Iran’s program

progresses dramatically, continue to press them, continue to

work on them—

ROBERT SIEGEL One minute—

PATRICK CLAWSON —and not tolerate it. Furthermore, as George laid out at the end

of his presentation, there are excellent reasons to think that, in

fact, the Iranian government is pretty cautious, in spite of this

Ahmadinejad of the moment. On the whole, right now the

Iranians think that they’re on top of the world and the strategic

situation’s very good for them. But that too will change, and our

job is to press them, press them so that the cautious element—

which I entirely agree with George is very much there in the

leadership—comes to the fore, and the Iranians decide that this

thing too risky, it’s not good for Iran’s security, and we can get

them to stop this program, or if the program’s advanced a long


way, we can get them to reverse it. Most of the countries that

have had nuclear weapons have given them up. So we do not

have to tolerate a nuclear Iran, we can get them to stop, or if

necessary to reverse.

[APPLAUSE]

ROBERT SIEGEL Thank you, Patrick Clawson. We now turn to the proponents

once again, and to Sanam Vakil.

SANAM VAKIL Thank you. It’s a pleasure to be here tonight to tell you why we

must tolerate a nuclear Iran. It’s time for the United States to

rewrite the balance of power. Iran has been using its nuclear

program to bolster its legitimacy, domestically in Iran, regionally

in the Middle East, and internationally, And this tactic is coming

at the expense of American credibility and influence in these

arenas. So by engaging Iran over its nuclear program,

Washington can take this tool of coercion out of Tehran’s hands,

and once again have a larger degree of influence as well as

credibility within Iran, within the region of the Middle East, and

internationally. Let me tell you how Tehran is using its nuclear

program to its advantage. Let me start with the domestic.

By engaging, the U.S. would prevent the Iranian regime from

using the nuclear program as a pretext for regime preservation.


Through its domestic policies, Tehran has advanced its power

under the guise of this program. The administration of Mahmoud

Ahmadinejad is tactically manipulating its nationalistic nuclear

ambitions to foster support domestically. Important though, is if

you ask the average Iranian, what is nuclear energy, or what is

uranium enrichment, they wouldn’t be able to tell you. This is

what the government has homed in on. They’ve been able to

exploit the double standards that exist within the international

community, vis-à-vis Iran’s nuclear program, compared to India’s,

Pakistan’s, North Korea’s, and even Israel’s. This is what the

government draws strength. An edict was issued roughly six

months ago through the National Security Council preventing

negative media from being reported on nuclear issues

domestically, and the government uses censorship of media to

control popular access to any nuclear-related information, among

other information as well.

This way, the government has been successful in perpetuating

nuclear nationalism, and controlling the effect of that

nationalism. For Iran, the nuclear issue is linked to the nation’s

place in the modern world, national pride, and resistance against

the West. An effort to prevent Iran’s program from advancing is

further associated to discrimination, and perpetuated by fears of

sanctions and regime change. More interestingly, as I observed


this summer during my visit to Tehran, Ahmadinejad has more

support throughout Tehran today and in other cities on foreign

policy issues than he did last year after he was surprisingly

elected.

This is due to his confrontational approach, compared to the

policy of détente that was pursued under the Hatami

administration. You might ask why. That’s because many

Iranians feel quite happy and proud that he has taken on the

nuclear portfolio and succeeded in garnering more concessions

for Iran, compared to what was going on during the tenure of

President Hatami. So these confrontational tactics are also

domestic tactics pursued by the government, acts of deflection to

perpetuate a constant state of fear domestically, with regards to

sanctions and even a military strike, and these tactics are

designed to strengthen the hand of the regime and the unclear

program. This is why we should tolerate a nuclear Iran. We

should think about the Iranians at home that have to suffer

under the regime. The same time, the government is using the

opportunity of the nuclear threat to launch a domestic crackdown

on elites within the system. They’ve closed down reformist

newspapers. They’re purging universities of secular academics.

They’re detaining students. They’re purging bureaucrats from the

system. All in an effort to silence opposition, and all under the


paradigm and all under the guise of the nuclear program.

The regime is ever more united in the face of opposition. Let’s

also consider a counter-factual. If we do not tolerate Iran’s

unclear program, we are playing into the hands of Ahmadinejad.

He dreams of becoming a war president. Why was he elected? He

was elected on an economic platform. He was elected to be a

populistic President. But since he’s been in power for the past

year, he has yet to meet the demands of the people, and he has

been pursuing foreign policy issues, not economic ones. Any

nuclear strike, military strike, or sanctions would give him just

cause for continuing to neglect his electoral mandate.

So let me offer you even one more final reason why we should

tolerate a nuclear Iran on the domestic agenda. The government

is further playing to these domestic nationalistic sentiments of

the Iranian street, and playing up against the Iranian street that

has historically been very pro-American. They’re using their

imagery of the war, and they’re using fear of sanctions and regime

change to change the sentiment in Iran against the United States,

and this is a huge loss for Washington. Let’s turn to the region.

Ahmadinejad has also exploited the nuclear issue to no end. This

issue has gained a lot of support among the Arab and Muslim

street. He’s spoken of the double standards that exist among


U.S. policies in the Middle East. He’s taken on the plight of the

Palestinians, challenging the order in the recent war this

summer, and he’s earned praise in capitols from Cairo to Jakarta.

There’s also a credible—


SANAM VAKIL —threat of proxy war. It’s a notable one, and the regime has

cultivated relations with proxies to counterbalance the very large

American presence in the region with two unfinished wars on

Iran’s borders. So Tehran’s message is simple—it’s a regime not

to be reckoned with [sic]. The U.S. is in a weakened position in

Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon, Afghanistan, and with this growing

conflict within the religion of Islam. Tehran is exploiting this to

its advantage, drawing on the Arab street for support at the

expense of the United States. Internationally. The regime’s

confrontational regional and domestic approach of the nuclear

program has also divided and weakened the international

community at Washington’s expense. Unable to unite the

international community and drive a consensus on sanctions,

only weakens Washington’s position further. Jacques Shirac

recently defected, and China and Russia are unable to back

Washington—



SANAM VAKIL —on any sanctions in this nuclear jockeying that’s going back

and forth. Let’s compare Ahmadinejad. He’s able to rally 118

NAM nations to support Iran’s ambitions, and the United States

can’t rally the P-5 and the Security Council? That’s depressing.

So, Ahmadinejad says he supports dialogue, let’s take him up on

this offer. I leave you with this. The U.S. is losing the Iranian

street, it’s moving into dangerous territory in the Arab and

Muslim world, and it’s losing support in the Security Council.

Let’s take the lever away from Tehran. Let’s not allow them to

exploit their nuclear program at our expense anymore. Thank

you.

[APPLAUSE]

ROBERT SIEGEL Thank you, Sanam Vakil. Our next speaker, opposing the

motion, is Reuel Marc Gerecht.

REUEL MARC GERECHT Bigotry against tall men. I just want to start off by thanking

George for using my own words against me. [LAUGHTER] I sort

of had the sensation of arguing with my wife and I inevitably lose

those encounters. I will suggest that perhaps he maybe used

some of my words a little selectively. I mean, I think Patrick


handled the geo-strategic issues rather well, I’m not going to go

back over those. I also am not going to go over a point-

counterpoint on the individual repercussions of a bombing run. I

did that, as George said, at great length in a Weekly Standard

piece and there’s no reason for me to torture any of you here who

read it the first time through. But I will focus on a couple of

issues which I think tend to get overlooked, particularly in

American and Europe audiences. When I hear the other side

talking, I hear them talking about Iran as if it’s a status quo

country. I almost never hear them talk about God. I almost

never hear them talk about the religious inspiration that still

fuels the regime at the very top. What people have been

anticipating inside of the Islamic republic for the longest period of

time, is that it would go thermidor.

They thought it with Rafsanjani, who by the way should really be

considered the father of the Iranian nuclear weapon. They

thought it with him, even though at the very same time he was

unleashing the Intelligence Ministry, the Revolutionary Guard

Corps and assassination teams and bombing teams that went

around the world in the 1980s and ‘90s. They thought it about

Rafsanjani when he was calling these ecumenical movements,

bringing in Sunni militants into Tehran on a regular basis and

having outreach programs. By the way, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al


Qaeda’s number two, has been probably Tehran’s favorite poster

boy for over 20 years. I will just add there’s something deeply

suspicious about members of Al Qaeda moving through Iran

before 9-11 and moving through Iran after 9-11.

It’s also very unusual for individuals who are under house arrest

in Tehran to be placing cell phone calls to operational units of Al

Qaeda in Saudi Arabia. That is not the usual routine that people

have when they’re under house arrest. I think we have to

understand that absolutely, when you deal with the vast majority

of Iranian people, certainly Iranian men—these are the ones we’re

primarily talking about—that that chiliastic drive that you saw in

the 1980s, they were really the mothership of much of the

jihadism mentality that we see today transferred over to the

Sunni world, it’s dead. It died. If nothing else it died with the

end of Khomeini who was sort of the charismatic inspiration.

Unfortunately for the hardcore and for the elite, it’s not dead. I

would argue it is as alive today as it was before.

That doesn’t mean, once again, that you will not find individuals

in that league who cannot be, quote, quite pragmatic. I was quite

struck by the commentary of the fellow on CBS, the very, very old

fellow, who went to interview Ahmadinejad and he said he seemed

like a very rational man. That is I think a very Western comment,


because we have this sort of false juxtaposition that individuals of

die-hard belief and faith cannot be rational. They absolutely are.

I mean Khomeini was a very, very rational man, he had a certain

love of Neoplatonism that people don’t talk about but he was a

more or less rational man. The same is true of Ahmadinejad but

Ahmadinejad is a die-hard believer. So by the way is Khomeini,

so by the way I would argue is Rafsanjani. What we have to

worry about, is in fact that the anti-Americanism at that level has

not diminished. You have to think, do you want to do what is

necessary to try to stop them from getting nuclear weaponry,

because you’re not primarily talking about an exchange of

nuclear weapons being a firing-off between the United States and

Iran. The Iranians realize that will probably end up very badly for

them.

What are you interested in is, will this give them an umbrella for

protection of terrorism. I think if you look at the Western track

record dealing with the clerical regime, that you have to say we’ve

done a very poor job of responding to them. In many ways we

have been at war with the Islamic republic since its inception,

except we have not responded. They have bombed, they have

attacked, they have killed American soldiers, we did not respond.

I suggest to you that what you’re going to see life they get nuclear

weapons is a new inspiration, I think it’s already out there, and I


would expect that Ahmadinejad is once again trying to do what

Khomeini and Rafsanjani had tried in the 1980s and failed.

That was to lead the radical Islamic world on a new anti-

American jihad. I think you’re going to see them try to do it

again, and the acquisition of nuclear weapon is a key to that

element. It is their safeguard, it is their protection. Once they

have that I would argue that in fact the odds of them being able

to strike the United States through proxies or directly will go up

astronomically. Should you take that risk? I would say no, that

you have to say, do you want to give individuals who run what I

would call sort of a more sophisticated version of bin Ladinism,

do you want to let them have the nuke? I would say under no

circumstances. Is it worthwhile to take the repercussion from

that in Afghanistan, which I don’t think are that much, in Iraq,

and I might add, the way Iraq is going it’s going to be so bad—


REUEL MARC GERECHT —it’s going to be very difficult for the Iranians to try to make a

difference. If you are willing to absorb the repercussion of that, I

would say yes, absolutely, the nightmare scenarios that you

would have when you have this hardcore elite, which I would

argue will become more and more radical. Because in fact the


vast majority of Iranians have sheared away from the visions and

the dreams and the promises of the Islamic revolution. They are

not going in the direction of their citizenry, would that they were.

They’re going in the opposite direction. The people inside of that

regime, particularly I would argue the most important people, the

clergy, the dissident clergy that I would argue are still the hope

for that regime in the future, have in fact lost ground if not been

completely stuffed. I would agree with Sanam that public

diplomacy is a very good idea. The United States should try to

wage as best a public diplomacy as possible. But public

diplomacy is not going to—


REUEL MARC GERECHT —the nuclear weapons issue. Would that we actually could

improve our position inside Iran, and I would just add by the way,

the United States has a far better position inside that country,

and it has maintained a relatively, if not pretty seriously hostile

position against the Islamic republic now for over 25 years, while

the Europeans have constantly tried to use engagement, yet their

position inside of Iran I think is far, far less. Hostility towards the

clerical regime has not cost us inside that country, it has in fact

gained us a following. So you have to decide, are you willing to

take a really serious risk, and I would add just tactically, you


have to say yes. Because diplomacy you know isn’t going to work

unless you threaten the possibility, you have to be serious about

it, of using military strikes. The only reason the Europeans—and

they will tell you that if you talk to the Germans and the French

and the British—

ROBERT SIEGEL Time is up, Reuel.

REUEL MARC GERECHT Time’s up?

ROBERT SIEGEL We’ll hear from the Europeans later I think. Thank you very

much, Reuel Marc Gerecht. [APPLAUSE] Now our third and final

speaker in support of the motion, and that is Karim Sadjadpour.

KARIM SADJADPOUR Okay. Thank you so much for coming, it’s really a privilege to be

here and it’s a privilege to be personally speaking for Bill Kristol.

It’s a big privilege and a big challenge. When I was in high school

my father used to watch the Sunday morning talk shows. My

favorite guest was always Bill Kristol because he was always so

thoughtful and sensible and sensitive, I just assumed he was a

liberal. I must admit I was a late bloomer intellectually.

[LAUGHTER]

I would just like to first start off by reiterating the point that


George made, that I think all six of us here are after the same

thing at the end of the day—an Iran which is democratic, which is

free, which is prosperous, and which is not armed with a nuclear

weapon. That would be the ideal option. So the question is not

whether or not the Islamic republic is a cruel regime. It is, I can

tell you as someone who has been detained in Tehran by the

Revolutionary Guard, it is a cruel regime. The question is not,

again, why or whether or not Iran should have a nuclear weapon

we should tolerate. I think personally it would be disastrous if

they were to acquire a nuclear weapon. But the question on our

panel is, should we tolerate it, and that begs the question, should

we go to war with Iran to prevent it. Which cost would be higher,

to actually accept Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon, or going to

war with them to prevent it.

I would suggest that the latter option would be far more

dangerous, bombing Iran to prevent it from acquiring a nuclear.

I’m a bit surprised tonight that the other side of the table is

seeming to—I’m a bit too junior to contradict them too much—but

they’re running away from the argument somewhat because both

Reuel and Bill are on the record saying that they would bomb

Iran. So hopefully, we hear that from Bill in the next round.

[LAUGHTER] I would just argue similar to what Sanam said,

that if Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was here tonight, he would be


arguing on the other side of the table, meaning I think he very

much wants to see a confrontation between the U.S. and Iran.

I will just suggest why in three different contexts, why the

Iranians, particularly the hard-liners in Tehran, would like to see

a confrontation between the U.S. and Iran. The first context is

the regional context. What was very interesting for me following

the right-wing Iranian media was these comments which

Secretary Rice made after the war in Lebanon in July. What she

called it was “the birth pangs of a new Middle East.” When I was

following the Iranian right-wing media, it was very interesting

how much they agreed with Secretary Rice, they said indeed it is

the birth pangs of a new Middle East. Indeed this is a proxy war

between the U.S. and Iran for hegemony in the Middle East, for

Arab and Muslim hearts and minds. In fact we’re very well-

placed to fight this war, and what’s very disconcerting right now

is that these same newspapers in Tehran which are very fascist

when it comes to domestic politics, are Jeffersonian democrats

when it comes to regional politics because they say, actually,

democratic elections are very much in our interest.

Hamas came to power in Palestine, Hezbollah came to power in

Lebanon through democratic elections, the Muslim Brotherhood

had a very strong showing in Egypt. Hardcore religious came to


power in Iraq via democratic elections. So in fact, we are winning

this war for Arab and Muslim hearts and minds, and given the

U.S.’s low standing in the region, it looks like history is now on

our side. Opinion polls which are conducted show that among

the Arab street, the three most popular leaders are Hassan

Nasrallah of Hezbollah, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, and

Khaled Meshaal of Hamas. So right now Iran feels in a very good

position, and I think that bombing the country they would feel

even better-placed to fight this war for Arab and Muslim hearts

and minds.

We should take into account that if we bomb Iran, oil prices are

likely going to go up to $150 a barrel. Currently the regime is

making about $200 million a day on oil revenue, so we double

that, they’re going to make $400 million a day on oil revenue. I

would argue that that will put them in a far better position to

support Hamas and Hezbollah financially than if we don’t bomb

the country. I think that just, if we’re serious about fighting this

war, which is becoming very much this self-fulfilling prophecy of

the clash of civilizations, we’re going to have to figure out a way to

resolve our differences in the Middle East without using bombs.

The second point is from a non-proliferation perspective, from a

nuclear perspective. What would happen if we actually bomb

Iran to try to prevent them from acquiring a nuclear weapon.


Let’s play out the scenario, in fact I played out the scenario with a

Navy captain.

Say we bomb these sites. First of all we don’t know where many

of them are, some of them are underground, some of them we

don’t have intelligence on, so we can’t be sure that we bombed

the right sites. Second of all some of them are near population

centers, we would be killing Iranian civilians. Quite frankly, you

know, if you talk to nuclear physicists they say, well, Iran

actually has quite a bit of know-how right now. It’s like baking a

cake. They have the ingredients, they have the recipe, and they

have the cooks, they have the scientists. Unless you’re going to

kill the scientists, you’re going to kill the cooks, I mean, it’s going

to be very difficult to set back this program a long way. At most,

in talking to nuclear physicists, it will take Iran two to three years

to recalibrate. At that point, if we bomb them, international

public opinion may well side with them, and the Iranians may say

in fact we now are after a nuclear weapon because we now have

been shown that we need it to protect our sovereignty.

At that point, when you bomb these sites and you don’t know

where Iran is recalibrating these facilities, maybe underground, if

we really then want to avert the prospect we’ll have to send in

group troops. At this point, with our troops spread thin in Iraq


and Afghanistan, that doesn’t look like a welcome prospect. Now

from the domestic perspective, this is the one that for me I feel

most strongly about. When I first started this job, I didn’t get

involved in this work because I was passionate about centrifuges

and cascades and things like that, this is what George was

saying—


KARIM SADJADPOUR —but about the prospect of the future for the Iranian people.

There’s this widespread notion that all Iranians are in favor of a

nuclear program, which I would like to debunk. I think that, on

one hand Iran is a nationalist country, and many people feel

strongly that we’re a great nation, why this double standard.

India and Pakistan can have this project, why can’t we. But at

the same time this is a country that we forget experienced an

eight-year war with Iraq. Not really one family was left unscathed

by this war, there were half a million casualties. No one

romanticizes the conflict or the prospect of further militarization.

Quite frankly this is a very technical project, the idea of enriching

uranium as opposed to importing enriched uranium from abroad,

so the idea that your average Iranian in Shiraz or Tehran wakes

up in the morning and says, you know, if only we could enrich

uranium today our lives would be so much better half, has also


been very much exaggerated.


KARIM SADJADPOUR But I would argue that you present to the Iranian people two

options. You present this publicly to the regime. A, pursue this

nuclear program unequivocally, come what may, for the

sanctions, isolation, potential militarization. Or B, you take

certain nuclear compromises and you reenter the international

community. You’re going to have the people put a lot of pressure

on the regime to change their behavior, and so far this has not

been a policy option which has been issued by the U.S. Thank

you very much.

ROBERT SIEGEL Thank you. [APPLAUSE] That’s Karim Sadjadpour, and now

speaking against the motion, Bill Kristol.

WILLIAM KRISTOL Thank you, Robert. Let me begin by thanking Bob Rosenkranz

for bringing Intelligence Squared to New York and to the United

States. I don’t know if Intelligence Squared has a slogan or motto

in London, but over here you might want to think about, “Fair

and balanced.” [LAUGHTER] “We debate, you decide.” You

might almost call this a no-spin zone here, you know. With

Robert Siegel, it’s Bill O’Reilly… [LAUGHTER] I shouldn’t have


said that, this will ruin his career on NPR, and I’ll never be invited

back to “All Things Considered.”

I personally came in undecided, um, as many of you did, and

even leaning slightly to the other side, but I’ve been convinced by

Reuel and [LAUGHTER] Patrick’s brilliant arguments. Bob said

he wanted intellectually respectable positions on both sides, and I

have a high opinion of George and Sanam and Karim. But I’ve

got to say that, unfortunately, they’re intelligent people but the

arguments, while respectable, are not convincing. I was put off

by Karim’s false praise [LAUGHTER] of me for a second, and I

salute Sanam for her genuine concern obviously for the Iranian

people who I think we all agree deserve a much better regime

than they have, and I think we all agree, we haven’t talked about

this, deserve much more aggressive efforts on the part of the

United States and other democracies and Europe could do much

more here, to help them liberate themselves from this regime.

George is one of the more reasonable Democrats in Washington.

I’ve known him for a while and he worked for Senator Biden and I

know that to be a fact, but the tip-off for all of you was when he

said that he didn’t believe we should kill ourselves. [LAUGHTER]

GEORGE PERKOVICH I thought that was the safe position.


WILLIAM KRISTOL That was a courageous break from the mainstream of the

Democratic Party… [LAUGHTER] I want to pay tribute to George,

I’m doing my best to ruin all these people’s careers—

GEORGE PERKOVICH That’s the conservative position against euthanasia—

WILLIAM KRISTOL I’m doing my best to ruin all of their careers. Look, we should not

tolerate a nuclear Iran. Three quick reasons, and a couple of

them have been touched on but maybe not developed. George

says, and I think everyone probably agrees that we have to be

tougher in our diplomacy, think more seriously about sanctions,

and move perhaps outside the Security Council to get sanctions if

we can, explore financial pressure to really squeeze Iran which I

think the administration is beginning to do. Secretary of the

Treasury Paulsen is working pretty seriously on this, and that

would be done I think outside the Security Council through a sort

of coalition of the willing on the Finance Ministry side. This is all

good. None of this will work unless it’s backed up by the threat of

force. Diplomacy will only work if there is a real threat of force,

not just saying options are on the table, but a sense that we

really won’t tolerate the outcome if Iran does not yield, if the

moderates to the degree there are some in the Iranian regime,

aren’t empowered by the pressure we’re putting on to prevent the


headlong rush to nuclear weapons, and manage to change course

domestically.

Diplomacy can’t work without the threat of force, therefore, it

would really be disastrous to diplomacy to say, we must tolerate a

nuclear Iran. So whatever people might think one would have to

do, and sometimes one has to do things in the real world seven or

10 years from now or three years from now I suppose, we should

not say we should tolerate a nuclear Iran and therefore you

should all vote “No,” just to help diplomacy along. [LAUGHS]

But I’m serious about that, and I’m serious that I believe

shouldn’t at the end of—I will satisfy Karim and say that I would

bomb Iran in a pinch. But it is important to not even signal

weakness.

The only reason the Europeans got serious in 2003 is that we

went into Iraq, that we hadn’t yet encountered the difficulties

we’ve encountered in the subsequent three years, and Iranians

were worried and the Europeans were worried that Bush really

would use force. That’s what made the Europeans much tougher

than it looked as if they would have been prior to 2003. So for

diplomacy to work, you need the credible threat of force, you

therefore could not say that we would tolerate, or certainly not

that we must tolerate a nuclear Iran. So for diplomacy to work


you need the threat of force. The credible, real threat of force.

Real plans, real attempt to lay the groundwork for it if it comes to

that. Secondly, deterrence. That is the ultimate argument

obviously on the other side, we can deter Iran, we deterred the

Soviet Union, we deterred China. Pakistan and India have

nuclear weapons and so far at least haven’t used them. That

depends on the nature of the regime. Is this the Brezhnev

regime, so to speak? Conservative, cautious old men, as George

said? Or is this a much more radical regime, or at least a regime

with radical elements in it, and do we have confidence that the

radical elements won’t prevail internally? I don’t think so.

This is a rising, confident, ambitious, aggressive regime, that

thinks it’s carrying forth a historic mission, sort of a jihadist

mission on behalf of Islam in general, particularly Shia Islam but

perfectly willing to work with Sunni jihadists and also to compete

with Sunni jihadists in radicalism which is itself very dangerous

and of course that’s the story in some respects of the last 25

years in the Middle East, with the Wahabes and the Iranians

competing to radicalize Islam and unfortunately, succeeding.

Letting Iran progress towards nuclear weapons just increases the

strength of all the worst radicalizing forces, the jihadist forces,

within Islam. It would be disastrous in my opinion not just for


Iran to get nuclear weapons. It’s disastrous for them to succeed

in progressing towards nuclear weapons over the next two, four,

six, eight years. Every month that we huff and puff and the

Europeans huff and puff and we put off another Security Council

resolution and they progress and Ahmadinejad comes here and is

treated well by the Council of Foreign Relations and—

ROBERT SIEGEL Two minutes.

WILLIAM KRISTOL —and pays no price for anything he says or anything he does,

every month and every year that that happens, the worst forces in

the Middle East are strengthened, every government that’s

teetering and isn’t sure which side to join basically, our side, the

moderate side or the radical side, decides they have to cut a deal

with the radical side. Individuals decide that looks like the way of

the future, this is the classic, dangerous scenario. One hopes

that the more moderate people, the more moderate forces in the

Iranian regime, are going to prevail, and the only way to help

them to prevail, is not to reward Ahmadinejad.

That is what we are now doing by holding open the possibility

that we would tolerate a nuclear Iran. It’s not just that it would

be terrible if they got nuclear weapons. There, I think

incidentally, it’s not just tolerating a nuclear Iran, it’s tolerating a


nuclear Egypt and a nuclear Saudi Arabia, and then a whole

bunch of nuclear countries which itself creates a very dangerous

world. It is also the process of getting towards a nuclear Iran, is

itself extremely dangerous—

ROBERT SIEGEL One minute.

WILLIAM KRISTOL I don’t like to use models from the ‘30s or the analogy of the ‘30s

or Hitler but in this respect it is like the ‘30s. Hitler’s success at

each stage strengthened him internally, he didn’t start out in firm

control of the regime of which he was chancellor. There were

others who thought he was reckless. Every time he did

something reckless and got away with it, it discredited his

internal credits, it empowered fascists elsewhere in Europe and

other regimes began moving in that direction. The democracies

became demoralized, we ended up fighting a war against a much

more powerful fascist alliance-axis than would have been the case

if we had acted much earlier. We face that prospect

unfortunately if we let a jihadist radical regime successfully

pursue nuclear weapons in the Middle East today.

[APPLAUSE]

ROBERT SIEGEL Thank you, William Kristol. I’m now ready to announce the

results of the pre-debate vote. Before the debate, you may recall


you were asked whether you were for or against the motion or

whether you don’t know. Here’s the pre-debate tally, for which

we will not need the U.S. Supreme Court to sort out the answer.

58 votes for the motion, that we must tolerate a nuclear Iran, 103

votes against the motion, and 58 don’t knows. So that was the

vote before the debate. We’re now ready for the question-and-

answer portion of the program. If you would like to put a

question to our panelists please raise your hand. Someone on

either one of the aisles will find you with a microphone. I’ll call

on you. As you’re asking the question, please stand up. If you’re

a member of the working press and asking a question, please

identify yourself. Otherwise it’s your call, and I’m going to begin

in the front row, with this young lady.

WOMAN Hi. I’m not sure how much of it is a question, but I think it is.

I’m on the “for” side, but I have to say the most compelling

argument on the “con” is, not the prospect of Iran having a

nuclear weapon but the prospect of Venezuela, Egypt. So I feel

strongly that yes, we must set a precedent, so that we don’t have

20, 30 nations with nuclear weapons. But then I wonder, how

realistic is that? You look at the nations that are pursuing

nuclear weapons, and these are nations that feel marginalized

and threatened. It’s definitely I think a pursuit, both for

protection and also for machismo or for popularity in their home.


So is it really realistic to think that we are going to now have 10

more nations with nuclear weapons in the 10, 20 years? The

kind of comment along with that too is there’s an interesting

vicious cycle that’s set in place when, by starting another war you

are creating this vicious cycle of other regimes feeling threatened,

and then spurring them on to produce nuclear weapons. Will we

be giving Chavez more of an impetus to get into the nuclear

weapon battle?

ROBERT SIEGEL Well, since the argument of the one-too-many nuclear Irans was

made by the opponents, may I ask the supporters of the motion,

George Perkovich, to answer it. Does tolerating a nuclear Iran

imply tolerating many other new nuclear powers?

GEORGE PERKOVICH Well, I think we’ll come to this later. We’re now confused about

what it means to tolerate or not to tolerate, because I happen to

agree with everything Patrick said because he didn’t talk about

going to war. I agree with Reuel and Bill, we should do everything

we can to try to prevent it. So if what we mean by “tolerating” is

that we really, really don’t like it, we’re going to do everything we

can to stop it, but we would accept living with it if that was the

alternative other than war, then I think we agree. If the

alternative really is what Bill said, but not what Patrick said, that

not tolerating it means that you are willing to go to war over it,


then I would say to your question, there’s only been one case in

history where there was a military effort to stop a country from

trying to get nuclear weapons.

That was the Israeli bombing of Iraq in 1981. You can argue

what the effects of that were in various ways. Iraq went to war or

was at war with Iran, and then, we had another war with them in

’91 and then we had another war with them in 2003, and their

nuclear program continued when we didn’t think it was from ’81

to ’91, but when we thought it was or some people thought it was,

it turned out it wasn’t. We’re there now. Every other case of

getting a country to stop involved politics, negotiations, giving

them benefits, security guarantees, trade-offs, and deals. So we

should be concerned about if Iran succeeds, what happens. But

the way the rest of the world’s going to respond to this is going to

be if you marshal diplomatic pressure, economic sanctions, plus

rewards. That’s the way to do it.

ROBERT SIEGEL Reuel Marc Gerecht, why don’t you reply to what George

Perkovich is saying.

REUEL MARC GERECHT I would just like to say that I’m very uncomfortable being in the

majority if that poll is correct. I think the other side should

demand a recount. But I mean, just a quick comment on that. I


don’t think it’s any coincidence that Gamal Mubarak announced

that Egypt is going to have a civilian nuclear program. I think the

timing of that, because of the Iranian nuclear program, was

intentional. I would add that there’s a great deal of suspicion

that the Saudis were in part financial backers of the Pakistani

nuclear program. It is impossible I think to overestimate the

fierce hatred and competition that exists and has existed between

Saudi Arabia and the Islamic republic from 1979, Bill alluded to

it.

Much of the Islamic militancy that we see today, the fuel behind

bin Ladinism, actually grew out of that competition in the 1980s.

It would be surprising not to see the Saudis make some play for a

nuke. I would also add, I wouldn’t at all be surprised to see

Turkey go in a nuclear direction. I think the Iraq war certainly

showed to the Turks they cannot rely upon NATO as an

institution of their defense, and I think the animosity that does

exist in Turkey, even if it goes in a more Islamic direction which I

think it will, will not diminish its profound suspicions of the

Islamic republic. I think it would be a good guess that the Turks

too would start working on a nuclear program.

ROBERT SIEGEL Next question, do we have someone on that side? Won’t you

hand the microphone…and then we’ll come over to the other side


of the room next. Could you stand up, please.

EUGENE LINDEN Eugene Linden’s my name. Given the present situation in Iraq

and Afghanistan, and the possibility of $150-a-barrel oil, do we

really have a credible military threat?

ROBERT SIEGEL You mean does, is the threat from the United States credible?

Patrick Clawson.

PATRICK CLAWSON In a word, yes. First off, if the United States military were to take

action Iran’s nuclear sites, this would be the Navy and the Air

Force, which are not overly committed in Afghanistan and Iraq. It

would be quite a doable thing to destroy the key nodes in Iran’s

nuclear program. We don’t have to flatten the whole thing, don’t

have to go in and Dresden and knock it all down. We just have to

knock out the key nodes, and there are some key nodes without

which that program cannot function, and it would take a number

of years to rebuild. The question arises as to what Iran’s

response would be if we did this. Well, we don’t know, it would

depend upon the circumstances.

But I would suggest that there was a time when in fact as far as

the Iranians are concerned, we did bomb them, and we did take

military action against them. That’s the end of the Iran-Iraq war,


when we after all, in what we see as a tragic accident, shot down

an Iranian airbus and killed 200-plus Iranian civilians. But they

saw that very bluntly as the United States entering the war.

Indeed, this being holy defense week, and the Iranian newspapers

have been full of interviews with people about the war and how it

happened, and Rafsanjani has asked, well why did you end the

war? Because America ended the war against us. So the fact is

that the last time we bombed Iran the result was within a week,

that the Iranians accepted a cease-fire, it stopped a war which

had killed 700,000 people. We paid no price in our relationships

with the Iranians. That’s because the Iranian people were sick

and tired of that war. So the task is up to us to paint this

nuclear weapon as the device which the mullahs are using to

consolidate their power and their control and to keep their grip on

the country. Because if Iranians perceive that what we are doing

is getting rid of the tool by which the mullahs are going to

consolidate their control, that’s a very different situation than if

Iranians think that this is a national bomb needed for national

defense.

ROBERT SIEGEL I wanted to see if the other side agrees that there is a credible

military threat, no ground troops, simply air strikes. Karim.

KARIM SADJADPOUR Obviously the United States is powerful enough to bomb Iran,


that’s not the question. The question is the day after we bomb

Iran, just like the question in Iraq should have been the day after

we bomb Iraq. Obviously the United States could change

probably every regime in the world apart from a few, China,

Russia, India. But what are the repercussions for the day after?

I would argue that at the moment even the Iranians believe that

Iranian soft power is dominating U.S. hard power in Iraq. I would

just put on the table that it’s fundamentally incompatible to think

we’re going to stabilize Iraq, while simultaneously dropping

bombs on Iran, not to mention other countries in the region. If

we really want to try to tranquilize Lebanon, we will see a

resurgent Hezbollah if we drop bombs on Iran. We want to

tranquilize Palestine and strengthen the moderate Palestinians

we’re going to strengthen Hamas, if we do that. I just want to

make a further point that, Bill and Reuel have written that it’s

unclear what would happen domestically within Iran if we

dropped bombs. Maybe actually, we could over time strengthen

the Iranian moderates. This always reminds me of a quote from

John Limber, the great U.S. diplomat who was actually taken

hostage in Iran for 444 days during the 1979 revolution.

He was someone like many Iranians, my father included, who

believed that when the Shah was deposed, the Shah’s government

would be replaced by a secular democracy, and what we saw of


course was that Khomeini came to, to power. He later wrote in

his memoirs that, that what he learned was that when sudden

upheavals happen, revolutions are not won by those who can

write incisive op-ed pieces. [LAUGHTER] I think likewise in Iran

we should have no illusions that if we bomb the country it’s going

to be moderates who come to the helm either within Iran or

within the region.

ROBERT SIEGEL Sanam Vakil?

SANAM VAKIL Could I just add one more thing. If we also think about bombing

Iran, we also have to think about not just nuclear nationalism

that persists within the country, but just inherent nationalism,

the patriotism of Iranians that they feel for their country, Iranians

who don’t even love the regime but love Iran. The same way that

you might love the United States of America or wherever you’re

from. These are the Iranians that will come out in defense of

their country. There are many Iranians I spoke with this

summer, that said in the event of a military strike, they would

come out in defense of their country and that’s something that we

should consider. These are the people that fought an Iran-Iraq

war, not for two years, not for four years, for eight long years.

And that same way that you, your sons and your children would

come out and defend the United States in the event of a military


strike.

ROBERT SIEGEL Reuel Gerecht?

REUEL MARC GERECHT Yes, I don’t think anyone on this side of the table believes that

bombing Iran will produce a moderate revolution inside the

country, and in fact I think we’d say that’s really not the issue at

all. The issue is do you believe that an Islamic republic armed

with nuclear weapons is going to help the United States stabilize

Iraq. I think that is not at all true, just the opposite. As long as

the radical forces inside of Iran gain power and gain will, I think it

is impossible to imagine a situation inside of Iraq that is going to

be stable and in any way pro-American. I think you will see the

forces of radicalism inside the Iraqi Shia community, continue to

gain ground, they’re becoming a dominant force in that society,

and Iran has no intention of deterring them. Certainly an Iran

armed with nuclear weaponry, I don’t think would be a force of

moderation inside Iraqi politics.

ROBERT SIEGEL Our next questioner? Sir.

MAN I’m very sympathetic obviously to the “con” side. But I think one

question has to be answered, which is: at this present time, what

are you going to do about Western Europe. What are you going to


do about the Europeans in terms of their support or non-support

for this kind of event, and the reality that in another two years

we’re going to have another election. Blair is on his way out,

clearly the sense or spirit of accommodation is reflected I think in

both the Labour Party and in the Conservative Party. So rather

than just thinking in terms of next month, what is one’s answer

to the question, how can we really threaten this unilaterally if we

cannot bring any of the major powers in Europe along with us.

ROBERT SIEGEL Bill Kristol, what’s the answer to that question.

WILLIAM KRISTOL The only reason the major powers in Europe are as engaged as

they are diplomatically and at least talking, some of them,

sometimes, about sanctions, on Iran is that in fact they were

worried in 2003 that we might use force. As the threat of force

has receded, as we’ve been so reassuring in the last year and

embraced diplomacy and made clear to the Europeans that we

put getting along with Europeans I think unfortunately perhaps

at a higher level of priority than actually dealing with the Iranian

nuclear program, they of course have cheerfully backed off.

They’re not going to be ultimately extremely helpful in this. They

will not privately shed any tears for the Iranian nuclear program

and I don’t think we’ll have any great rupture in NATO, we’ll still

have peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan. But no, they will


probably not be part of the mission, and they will in some

ritualistic way, probably denounce it. But if a nuclear Iran is

really dangerous and I think it is, we can’t be stopped by the

lowest common denominators of our allies. The unfortunate

truth, I wish Western Europe were different, I wish all of Europe

were somewhat different, I wish they spent more on the military, I

wish they were more serious about dealing with coming threats

from outside their region. They’re not, and we have to take the

lead.

ROBERT SIEGEL Our next question, from the gentleman in the center.

VAN GREENFIELD Van Greenfield. I voted against to start, I’m still there now. I

think that when we recount again, if Karim and Sanam actually

listen to their o

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MEDIA TRANSCRIPTS, INC. - Intelligence Squared US · 2006. 9. 27. · Media Transcripts, Inc. PROGRAM Rosenkranz Foundation—“Intelligence Squared U.S.” “We must tolerate a